2009 has been a year filled with lots of product changes, many scholarship opportunities, programs and competitions geared specifically for students. We've had so much fun working on ways to improve our connection to and relationship with students like you. So thanks for subscribing to our blog, following us on Twitter, and becoming fans on Facebook. We can't wait for all that's in store for 2010, and in the meantime -- Happy Holidays.

The Google Docs team is celebrating the holidays in big ways this year. With nine launches in the last two weeks - and a gallery full of festive templates - there will be no shortage of cheer!

Holiday Templates:

There are a lot of great holiday templatesavailable in the Google Docs template gallery. Templates include holiday shopping lists, holiday newsletters, party invitations, RSVP forms and much more. Whether you are planning a recipe swap, family potluck, ski trip, a charity trip or need a party RSVP form, the new holiday themes in forms can also make this season a little brighter. To try out the holiday themes, create a form and the click "Theme: theme name" to see all the themes that are available.

The Docs team has also launched several new features, just in time for the holidays:

Real-time presence for presentations: now when editing a presentation with a co-editor, you can see which slides he or she is editing, and if you're on the same slide, you can see which element – text box, shape, image, video, etc -- is being edited.

Sharing emails get a face-lift: More colorful emails and icons now indicate the type of document at-a-glance, better showcasing custom messages and making access even more simple.

Sort by relevance: When searching your docs, results will now display the items most relevant to your search at the top of the list.

Export all documents: We've also added an "Export all" option, which lets you export all your docs (up to 2GB at a time) with one click. This is the equivalent of almost 100,000 Google Docs.

Change owner in a spreadsheet: A feature already available for documents and presentations, you can now change the owner of a spreadsheet. This is helpful if you are working in a group and the owner of the document leaves your group or no longer needs to work on that document.

We hope you enjoy these holiday treats when using Google Docs this holiday season. And stay tuned for more helpful updates in 2010.

Because we know students take a lot of pictures and appreciate great deals, we wanted to let you know about a special offer from Picasa. We made extra storage for Gmail and Picasa Web Albums more affordable about a month ago, and now we've partnered with Eye-Fi to make it even easier to get your photos into the cloud.

Eye-Fi offers WiFi-enabled memory cards that make your existing camera wireless, so it's easy to upload photos and videos right to Picasa Web Albums or straight to your computer -- no cables required. For a limited time, when you buy 200 GB of Google paid storage for $50, you'll get a free Eye-Fi card (a $95 value) with free shipping.

Today kicks off the nation’s first Computer Science Education Week. The goal of this week is to encourage students to learn about the discipline that powers the computers, applications and technology they use everyday. Computer Science Education Week emphasizes that our society's aspirations will be met by individuals who have an increasingly deep understanding of computer technology.

We've been thinking about ways that Google could help with computer science education for several years. After all, our search engine has been used in education since its inception — how many essays, research papers and theses begin with a Google search? Today, we'd like to summarize some of what we've been doing at Google to advance CS education. Our efforts focus on four strategic areas, with an emphasis on computing in core curriculum.

We have many people at Google who know about all areas of computer science, many with backgrounds and experience in education. With this deep base of computer science knowledge, we developed Google Code University to help faculty update their undergraduate computer science curriculum, and the Summer of Code, which gives students the opportunity to develop programs for various open source software projects.

Integrating computing curriculum across K-12 core subjects

A group of Google engineers and K-12 "teaching fellows" is working on building and testing models of curriculum to encourage innovation. These curriculum models revolve around "computational thinking", a problem-solving technique that draws on the thinking and analysis skills that computer scientists use everyday. Our goal is to integrate computational thinking across subject areas in K-12 by connecting these skills, which are already a part of core curriculum, more explicitly to computer science. We're also taking this a step further by integrating simple programming concepts in appropriate areas of core K-12 curriculum, such as algebra. Our hope is that by making computer science more visible and showing its connection to every subject area, students will experience the full power and utility of technology in areas of interest to them. Integrating CS into other subjects will also have the key added benefit of leveling the playing field, so that many more students will have the opportunity to gain a deeper understanding of computing.

Supporting organizations and individuals through community outreach

We've also worked for years with teachers and nonprofits to build early interest in the Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) fields. Besides providing financial support and sponsorship for many external organizations, we've developed a number of scholarship and internprograms to increase the number of women and underrepresented minorities in STEM and computer science. In addition to these formal programs, every day Googlers all over the world organize visits with students at nearby schools and community centers to teach, present workshops and tech talks, and to share their personal stories on how they became computer scientists and engineers.

We're absolutely delighted to be a co-sponsor of the first Computer Science Education Week. As a company, we've benefited so much from advances in computer science and the creativity of computer scientists. We also know that the next great innovators in computer science are out there, ready to be inspired to create technologies that change our world and benefit our society. We urge our children, parents, teachers and educational institutions to pay more attention to this critical field, and we will continue to do our share.

Posted by Alfred Spector, VP Research and Special Initiatives and Maggie Johnson, Director of Education and University Relations

Jeff Cameron is the Google Student Ambassador at the University of Waterloo, where he studies Computer Science and Math. As part of his role as ambassador, he recently hosted a great event focused on Artificial Intelligence, and we wanted to share his story with you here.

In the 2009 Artificial Intelligence Contest at the University of Waterloo, participants used both simple and sophisticated AI techniques to create programs that would intelligently play a simple game. The submitted programs competed in head-to-head tournaments to see how they all ranked compared to one another. Contestants could re-submit their code on the contest website as often as they liked, and the online leaderboard was updated once every hour with fresh tournament results.

A screenshot of the hourly leaderboard after the contest had been open for a few days.

The contest was initially supposed to stay open for two weeks, but was extended by another week due to unexpectedly high participation. Almost 300 participants were involved, with about 150 people submitting their entries to the final tournament. The contest webpage received over 50,000 hits from 38 countries. The final tournament took place at the Contest Finale Code Party, held at the University of Waterloo.

Pictures from the Contest Finale Codeparty. The very talented Mr. Jesse Onland serenades some happy coders with his mad banjo skills.

Some contestants huddle while adding the finishing touches to their entries.

Our congratulations goes out to the winner of this year's Google Artificial Intelligence Contest, Alexandru Stan! A big thank you also goes out to the University of Waterloo Computer Science Club for organizing and hosting the contest. Full contest results are available here.

Posted by Jeff Cameron, Google Campus Ambassador at University of Waterlo

Last month we asked you to nominate your campus to be photographed for Street View on Google Maps. We were inundated with more than 25,000 suggestions across all categories, and university campuses made up 44% of all suggestions!

We've narrowed the top suggested locations to a few finalists and there is now just one week left in the voting period. Cast your vote for your favorite place within each category to tell us which locations you'd most like to see on Google Maps. The university finalists are:

Arizona State University

Michigan State University

Princeton University

Rochester Institute of Technology

Stanford University

Visit www.google.com/trike to vote and see the other finalists! You can vote as many times as you like until the deadline at 11:59pm PST on Monday, November 30th. We'll then work on getting all the winners into Google Maps, and of course we'll work closely with the relevant organizations to collect images of any privately-owned locations.

If voting for Street View trike finalists gets you excited about how much you love Google Maps, be sure to check out our new Google Maps tips for life to help you save time, look smart, and manage your travels efficiently.

We had a chance to speak with intern Lu Chen this summer for theGoogler Beta Series,and she shared with us 5 reasons why interning for Google is awesome. Continue below to get Lu's unique perspective on working here at Google.

1)The People.Without a doubt, the Googlers are truly what makes working here awesome: every person I met was intelligent, dedicated, and just plain cool. Discuss this piece of code? Sure. Switch gears and talk about the latest episode of Top Chef? No sweat. There are smart and cool people at any job, but here at Google, finding them is a sure bet!

2) It's real.Over the course of my internship, I have gotten an accurate taste of what a career in software engineering is actually like. Interns are treated as, and essentially are - full time engineers. I worked within the same codebase and wrote to the same standards as my colleagues. Additionally, my project wasn't some busywork that no one would ever see or use after I left -- rather, I had the pleasure of working on some front-end features that will end up being seen and used by thousands of Blogger users! From the practical experience of working on such a large and fast-paced application, I've learned a lot about web development, product life cycles, and programming in general.

3) Being 'Googley'.Everyone at Google works insanely hard, but there is also a sense of fun that is endorsed by the company culture. During one offsite, I went on a white water rafting trip! Through the intern program, I also had the opportunity to have some fun with my fellow interns: paintball, indoor skydiving, hiking, etc. Alongside all of the fun, there is an unspoken expectation that every Googler knows his workload and gets it accomplished bt the end of the day. I wasn't told what hours to work or where on campus I should work (work next to frozen yogurt machine, anyone?). Not many companies give their employees such trust and freedom, and the culture is one area where Google really outshines its competitors.

4) One big company, lots of diverse opportunities.Although I was a part of the Blogger team, I got to experience and learn much more than Blogger engineering. For example, I took a mini-course on UX (User Experience) sketching and learned how to draft quick prototypes on paper. I even took a seminar on making mochas and espressos! Between tech talks, seminars, and 20% time, Google offers so many opportunities to continue learning. Even in the scope of my own project, it wasn't just daily coding; I had the opportunity to contribute towards the user experience, design, engineering and testing of my feature.

As part of Google’s ongoing commitment to encouraging students of underrepresented backgrounds in technology to pursue graduate study, we are pleased to host the first annual 2010 Google Graduate Researchers in Academia of Diverse backgrounds (GRAD) CS Forum. This forum will bring together students who are historically underrepresented in the field to connect with one another and with Google.

Up to 75 computer scientists will be invited to an all-expenses paid forum that will run Thursday evening through Saturday afternoon on January 21–23 at Google’s headquarters in Mountain View, CA.

The Google GRAD CS Forum will include technical talks from established researchers – both from Google and universities – and a unique occasion to build and strengthen networks with other emerging researchers. Students will also enjoy tours of the Googleplex, have the opportunity to meet with Google engineers in their focus areas, and have fun exploring the San Francisco Bay Area.

Eligibility Requirements

Applicants must:

be a computer science (or related technical discipline) graduate student currently enrolled in a Masters or PhD program at a university in North America

demonstrate academic excellence and leadership in the computing field

maintain a cumulative GPA of at least 3.3 on a 4.0 scale or 4.3 on a 5.0 scale or equivalent in their current program

The forum is open to all qualified graduate students, and is committed to addressing diversity in our company and in the technology industry. Students who are a member of a group that is historically under-represented in the technology industry are encouraged to apply, including female, Native American, African American and Hispanic students as well as students with disabilities.

Selection Process

Google engineers will select up to 75 attendees based on each applicant’s academic and technical achievements. Evidence of academic achievement and leadership experience should be evident from the resume.

How to Apply

Complete the online application and submit all required documents online. First-time users will be required to register and create an account. Please note that recommendation letters are not required.

Google RISE (Roots in Science and Engineering) Awards are designed to promote and support science, technology, engineering, mathematics (STEM) and computer science (CS) education initiatives. We provide awards to organizations working with university and pre-university students to provide enrichment programs in these fields. Support may include a combination of monetary awards ranging from $500 - $10,000, volunteer resources and in-kind donations.

Google believes that technology will continue to play an important role in shaping our future and knows that the youth of today will help innovate and drive these technologies for years to come. Through the Google RISE Awards Program, we aspire to help students take one step closer to achieving their potential by offering growth and development opportunities.

We're excited to announce the launch of Google Sites site templates. Site templates are pre-packaged sites that anyone can use to make creating your own website even easier. This is especially valuable for students so that when you're making your site you can now skip a few steps, and instead of making a site from scratch, start with a template.

You can use site templates to organize, publish and share information about your school, class, projects, fraternity or sorority, school club, intramural teams, or any other organization or event.

Additionally if you create a site that you think others might like or use, you can create a template and add it to the gallery!

To browse site templates click the Create new site button. You can choose one of the popular templates highlighted on the site creation page, or you can click Browse the gallery for more to see more options.

Google is pleased to partner with the Hispanic College Fund to offer scholarships for computer science students!

Google HCF scholarships will be awarded based on the strength of candidates’ academic background, leadership and passion for computer science. Recipients will each receive a $10,000 scholarship for the 2010-2011 academic year. Selected students will also be invited to attend the all-expenses-paid Annual Google Scholars’ Retreat at the Googleplex in Mountain View, California in the Spring of 2010.

Eligibility Requirements:

Must be of Hispanic background

Be a U.S. citizen or permanent resident residing in the United States or Puerto Rico

Studying at an accredited university in the U.S. or Puerto Rico for the upcoming academic year

Enrolled (or plan to be) full-time for the upcoming academic year

Have a minimum GPA of a 3.5 on a 4.0 scale

Demonstrate financial need

junior or senior undergraduate or graduate student pursuing a degree in computer science or computer engineering for the 2010-2011 academic year

Our next entry for the Google Beta Series features an interview with intern Alex Sydell. Alex interned last summer at our Mountain View campus as a Software Engineer in Search Quality. Follow below as Alex details his unique experience at our global headquarters.

Q: Hi Alex, thank you for joining us today. Could you briefly explain your summer internship project with Google this summer?

A: Sure. My team creates and maintains tools that are used to evaluate the quality of Google's search results. I worked on a new web-based user interface (UI) that automates part of the evaluation process. My project allows engineers to more intuitively configure some of our tools and quickly get the new configurations into our codebase.

Q: What would you say is for your favorite part of working here at Google?

A: Being surrounded by Googlers! I have never been in a place with so many smart, talented, friendly, and open people. Everyone is easy to approach with a question, whether just asking for directions or having a detailed discussion about a project. And someone always offers a helping hand. It is incredibly easy to make friends at Google because there is a very little sense of superiority and no reservations between Googlers. The atmosphere at Google is second to none.

Q: Could you describe a moment during your summer that will be difficult for you to forget?

A: BBQ week before the 4th of July holiday. Three days of BBQ: Hawaii, Louisiana, and Texas-style! We ate what seemed like pounds of delicious BBQ meat and seafood each day, completely full but wanting more. I must admit, it was a bit hard to work after eating so much good food, but we all survived. There was even a mechanical bull and a mini petting zoo, giving us plenty of opportunity to make complete fools of ourselves falling off of the bull or chasing rabbits and goats around a little cage. Without distractions like these, work would be mundane and unmotivating. There so many exciting events constantly taking place around us, and Googlers have proven that it is possible to be incredibly productive while still having a lot of fun.

Today we're excited to announce the most recent addition to our scholarship programs in Europe, the Google Europe Scholarship for Students with Disabilities. This scholarship is designed for students with disabilities who are pursuing degrees in the field of computer science anywhere in the European Union, plus Switzerland and Israel. Multiple scholarships will be awarded based on the strength of candidates' academic performance and demonstrated passion for computer science.

Scholarships will be granted for the 2010/2011 academic year, and recipients will be invited to attend an all-expenses-paid retreat at Google's Engineering Center in Zurich in 2010.

Here's what Nelson Mattos, our VP for Product and Engineering in Europe, the Middle East and Africa, has to say about this scholarship: "We're committed to diversifying the long-term engineering talent pool for the industry as a whole. We hope that this scholarship will increase opportunities for students with disabilities and encourage them to pursue careers in computer science. The retreat fosters relationships so that scholars can form a supportive network lasting the full length of their academic studies and beyond."

We know that a diverse group of people use our tools and services and only an equally diverse workforce can anticipate our users' needs. We've found that the diversity of perspectives, ideas and cultures leads to the creation of better products to the benefit of all users of the Internet. We hope that this scholarship works towards that end.

Yesterday we announced an expansion of our Virgin America WiFi sponsorship to also include 47 airports. Both programs will offer free WiFi through January 15, 2010 and will cover more than 10 million passengers traveling this holiday season. There's no Google account or credit card required to log on, but we'll be offering the option to try out a Google product and also offer the chance to donate to one of three charities; we'll be matching donations up to $250,000.

We hope that this makes travel to be with friends and family that much better this holiday season.

You can learn more about the program at http://www.freeholidaywifi.com

We continue the Googlers Beta Series with a story from Alyssa Daw, a Google Summer Intern and BS student from Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo, who will share with you her experience as a Software Engineer in Test (SET) Intern in our Kirkland office.

Alyssa Daw was offered as an Software Engineering in Test (SET) with Google last winter and prepared vigorously by taking advanced coursework in computer science. "I was absolutely ecstatic when I got an internship at Google and I immediately set out to prepare myself by registering for the most difficult courses that I could for spring quarter," she says.

After her winter quarter, Alyssa was diagnosed with a rare medical condition and, after considering the severity of her situation, she contacted Google to give up her offer. "I called my manager to say that he could find someone else," she says. "But instead of taking me up on my offer, he offered to hold the job for me for as long as I wanted it - even if it meant finding shorter projects in case I needed to start late."

Alyssajoined Google this summer in the Seattle office as an intern in our SET group. And although her situation caused her to begin the internship behind schedule, she still had a very successful summer with us. "In the end, I did have to start a couple of weeks late, but the experience was amazing! I definitely felt the support from my whole team, especially my host who ended up getting Vice President approval for some of my accommodations."

Alyssa knew she was going to spend her summer as an SET, but she didn't quite understand what that meant at the time. "Before my internship, I thought that a Test Engineer primarily spent their time testing, and I am sure that in some cases this is true. However, during my internship with Google the only tests that I ran were against my own code - just like any other developer. I also got the experience of talking to users (in this case, other Googlers), and designing and developing a product that fit their specifications."

Her contribution to Google? A tool that allows admins to organize and display information about test labs. "I have never worked in a place where it was so easy to write quality code, test the code, have the code reviewed, and see all the comments, changes, test coverage, and more in one place. This is all thanks to some stellar internal tools. As I got into my own project, it hit me: I was adding to the stellar tools! It felt great to be giving back in this way, and to know that future Googlers would use my tool to make their lives easier.

The Google Online Marketing Challenge is a global student competition open to any higher education institution anywhere in the world. The 2009 Challenge had over 10,000 students in 57 countries competing and we want this year's Challenge to grow even more .... please help us to get the word out!

How it works ....

Teams of 3-6 students receive US$200 of online advertising with AdWords and then find local businesses to work with to devise an online marketing campaign. Teams outline a strategy, run their campaign, assess the results and provide the business with recommendations to further develop their online marketing. The winners are judged by an international panel of independent academics.

The challenge is a great way to get you and your classmates involved in the quickly evolving world of online marketing. It's a skill you'll want to have as you graduate and prepare to enter a tough job market and it's definitely a fun way to gain real-world experience with a real client.

Registration ....

Your professor, lecturer or whoever teaches you, enters their student team into the Challenge. If you think your professors, lecturers or tutors might be interested in signing their classes up for the Challenge, let them know about this opportunity! Your professor can obtain more information in the Academic Guide (http://www.google.com/onlinechallenge/students_guides.html) which is filled with information your professor will want to know to decide if the Challenge is right for their class.

The Challenge is open to any university, any discipline, at the graduate or undergraduate level in any country.

We had a busy summer here at Google interacting with students through a wide variety of scholarship, internship and networking opportunities across North America. Here's a look back at a few of our programs (you can bet we'll be hosting them again!) along with news on some upcoming initiatives.

For FUSE, we welcomed 50 rising college sophomores to our New York City office for a three-day retreat designed to connect students from groups that are under-represented in the field of computer science. The retreat focused on making connections between students and Googlers, encouraging students to create meaningful academic experiences and allowing them to learn more about possible career paths via hands-on activities, panel discussions and a bit of fun around the New York City area.

Another group of twenty rising sophomores spent two weeks at the Googleplex in Mountain View for the second annual Computer Science Summer Institute. This special program included an interactive and collaborative Computer Science curriculum, as well as a living-learning residential experience for student networking. Students worked in teams to create an interactive web application using Python in Google App Engine. When not in class, they heard technical talks from Google engineers, spoke with professionals from across the technology industry and academia about the many things they can do with a Computer Science degree. They also had some fun joining the Bay Area summer interns on a boat cruise and catching a baseball game after an exciting San Francisco scavenger hunt.

In addition, our engineering internship program hosted more than 450 college (undergraduate and graduate) interns in 15 locations across North America. These interns were an integral part of the engineering team and made significant contributions this summer working on exciting projects including Android, Chrome, Docs and machine translation.

We also had more than 100 students working across multiple functions, including sales and engineering in Mountain View, New York, Chicago, Ann Arbor, Washington, D.C., San Francisco and Boston as part of the Building Opportunities for Leadership and Development (BOLD) Program. BOLD is a 10-week internship program designed to provide exposure to the technology industry for students from groups that are historically underrepresented in technology. This summer experience includes a unique glimpse into a business or engineeringcareer, professional development and leadership courses, as well as one-on-one mentorship designed to further support professional growth.

Of course, we realize that growing future leaders in engineering and business doesn't just start with college students. For this reason, we partner with the LEAD programs in both businessand engineering to encourage outstanding high school students to pursue careers in these fields. This year, all four LEAD Summer Engineering Institute participants had the opportunity to tour a local Google office to attend technical talks and interact with Google engineers (okay, with some tasty food and video games thrown in as well).

If one or more of these opportunities sounds like something you'd like to participate in, you can find applications for full time opportunities and summer internship opportunities on ourstudent job site. Visit our scholarship page for more information on our scholarship opportunities. And follow us on Twitter and Facebook for updates on application deadlines and new program announcements.

Google Chrome is a web browser designed to load web pages and web applications at lightning speed. Whether it's searching directly and quickly from the browser's address bar when you need to do some intensive research, or getting to the websites you rely on quickly at the click of the mouse, Google Chrome is just fast. Google Chrome celebrated its first birthday just over a month ago with a brand new stable release, which means even more speed improvements, as well as a fresh redesign of some of its most loved features.

More recently, we introduced Artist Themes for Google Chrome. We invited leading artists, architects, musicians, illustrators, filmmakers and fashion and interior designers from across the globe to create artwork for an unusual canvas: the modern web browser. Since then, we've enjoyed hearing thoughts from our users on these designs and how they've used them to personalize the browser. We've also been intrigued by the ways in which these themes have had interesting and unusual cultural resonance with people around the world.

To continue celebrating this collaboration of engineering and art, we've collaborated with our friends at YouTube to launch a new video (with a surprise ending) that we hope showcases the full beauty of these themes. Check it out at youtube.com/googlechromethemes or click the image below. And if you haven't tried Google Chrome recently, download the latest version and give it a whirl.

This Sunday, October 25th @ 8:30 p.m. (PDT) tune in to see the world's biggest band performing on the world's largest stage. YouTube and U2 have joined forces to live stream U2's performance this Sunday at The Rose Bowl Stadium.

Available internationally in the following countries: US, UK, France, Canada, Italy, Spain, Japan, Brazil, Australia, NZ, Ireland, Mexico, India, Israel, South Korea, and Netherlands. It's happening "With or Without You" and it's an experience you wont want to miss.

In case you didn't see our announcement yesterday, Google is partnering with Virgin America to provide free WiFi on every Virgin America flight between November 10, 2009 and January 15, 2010. Travel can be hectic during the holidays, so at least this way you can spend your time in the air staying connected to friends and family or getting some last-minute cramming in for your Chem final.

You can find out more about our partnership, where Virgin America flies and how the in-flight WiFi service works at www.freeholidaywifi.com.

From the comfort of your own dorm room, Street View on Google Maps lets you scope out a restaurant before heading out there for a date (oh look, there's a flower shop next door) or preview your spring break hotel to be sure it meets your strict requirements (oh look, the beach is right across the street). But wouldn't it be nice if you could see more places in Street View? Places like hiking or biking trails, sports stadiums, and maybe even your university campus!

Freshmen could easily study what all the campus buildings look like, and your family could get a better sense of your new home. Think back to when you were applying to schools - wouldn't it have been handy to be able to virtually tour college campuses? Or better yet, picture how nice a Street View walk down memory lane will be after you graduate and start to feels pangs of nostalgia for college life.

Good news: you can now nominate your campus to be photographed for Street View on Google Maps. We've created the Street View trike, a mechanical masterpiece made of 3 bicycle wheels and a mounted Street View camera, to take pictures of places like university campuses that cannot be reached by car. Visit www.google.com/triketo nominate your school for a visit from the Street View trike.

To get an idea of what Street View pictures taken by the trike look like, you can check out San Diego State University, the first university included in Google Maps:

So far we've taken the trike to a few other campuses, including the University of Pennsylvania and Penn State, but all of you have a chance to nominate your school to be included next. Of course, we'll make sure to work directly with the administration at your school to get the necessary permissions and approvals before coming on campus - and, as with all Street View imagery, we'll blur identifiable faces.

We're also accepting nominations in 5 other categories for where to send the Street View trike next:

Parks & Trails

Pedestrian Malls (e.g., outdoor shopping areas, boardwalks)

Theme Parks & Zoos

Landmarks

Sports Venues (e.g., golf courses, racing tracks, stadium grounds)

Head to www.google.com/trike by October 28 to submit your nomination. After we comb through the submissions and pick out the finalists, you will have the opportunity to vote on a winner from each category for the Street View trike to visit. May the best campus win!

Today – October 15 – is known as Blog Action Day, an annual event that unites bloggers across the globe by posting about the same topic on the same day to help bring awareness to a certain issue. This year, the discussion is about Climate Change and we hope you'll check out the Official Google Blog to learn more about some of the steps we take as a company to address this important issue.

If you have blogs of your own, we also encourage you to post your own thoughts about the climate crisis and maybe some of the steps you're taking to contribute to change.

Ever found yourself being an armchair tourist looking at 3D buildings of your home town in Google Earth? Have you ever wanted to highlight that famous building in your city or on your campus, but not really been sure where to start?

Building Maker helps you put buildings on the 3D map.

Today we launched Google Building Maker, a fun and simple (and crazy addictive, it turns out) online tool for creating buildings for Google Earth. Basically, you pick a building and construct a model of it using aerial photos and simple 3D shapes – both of which we provide.When you're done, we take a look at your model. If it looks right, and if a better model doesn't already exist, we add it to the 3D Buildings layer in Google Earth.

Check out this video to see Building Maker in action:

For now, you can choose to make buildings in any of about 50 cities. We'll keep adding more cities, but don't feel left out if we don't have your hometown yet — modeling in a place you've never been is a fantastic way to discover more about it.

Simply, make sure you have the latest version of Google Earth installed on your computer. If you're on a Mac, you will need to download the Google Earth plug-in directly.

[From time to time we invite guests to blog about initiatives of interest, and are very pleased to have Stephen Savage join us here again. Stephen is Arizona State University's Geo-Archaeological Information Applications Lab IT Manager of the Archaeological Research Institute at the School of Human Evolution and Social Change. You might remember his previous posts about Exploring exploplanets using Google Earth's APIor his work on the Digital Archaeological Atlas of the Holy Land.]

For years, astronauts and rocket scientists at NASA and JPL have had all the fun. Billions of people on Earth have seen pictures of Apollo 17 astronauts Gene Cernan and Harrison Schmidt driving their "dune buggy" on the Moon. Billions more have seen pictures of NASA's Mars landers, Spirit and Opportunity. We've all wished we could be the ones to take these incredible toys out for a spin on the Red Planet or the Moon.

Now, thanks to Google, you can do the next best thing -- you can drive a virtual rover model on Google's Mars or Moon (or a skateboard on Earth), and experience the real topography of these places. We at ASU developed a "Drive the Solar System" website where you can explore how the power of Google Mars, Google Moon and Google Earth has been brought to the web. You can put your rover or skateboard down anyplace on Mars, the Moon or Earth and drive it anywhere you want to go. Explore the Apollo landing sites or Olympus Mons, the largest volcanic cone in the solar system. Drive down the Valles Marinaris, the canyon on Mars that dwarfs Arizona's Grand Canyon, or kick-flip your skateboard down the Amazon. And that's not all. You can visit all the other planets and the largest moons in the Solar System too.

But you can do more than drive or look at these strange new worlds -- you can also look at these places in depth with detailed information about each place you can visit included.

Google AISES scholars will each receive a USD $10,000 academic scholarship for the 2009-2010 academic year and are invited to attend the annual Google Scholars' Retreat at the Googleplex in Mountain View, California in 2010. The retreat is a time for Google to recognize the students’hard work and achievements, and to provide the scholars with an opportunity to meet computingprofessionals and network with other scholars. We hope this program will encourage students to continue to achieve great things in their studies and inspire them to become role models and leaders in science and technology.